Sheriff Thomas was a smart man. “Why’d he run off?”
Mac shrugged. “Maybe he was frightened. Maybe he went after Johnson. I’d left Will in charge of the household while I was gone—maybe he thought he’d done something wrong.”
“Seems odd,” the sheriff said.
“Teenage boys don’t always use good judgment.” Mac leaned forward over the lawman’s desk. “What are you going to do about Johnson?”
“We’ll look for him. But he could be anywhere now. I’ll let you know if we find him.”
“And Will?”
The sheriff shook his head. “We ain’t got time to search for a runaway. If me or my men see him, I’ll bring him home. But he could be anywhere, too.”
Will shivered in the early morning, wishing he had more than a burlap bag between him and the ground, and more than a shirt to stay warm. He’d eaten nothing but the raw eggs he’d puked up. Shanty, however, seemed calm, though his piles and urine stank up the small space. Will listened for Mr. Coates, the tenant, to leave. Then Will would muck out the shack and move on.
But where would he go? He could go to Jonah’s, but how would he explain why he’d left home? He couldn’t stay there, though Esther would probably give him a good meal. Could he spend days working with Jonah and Daniel and nights in this shack? Sooner or later, someone would find him.
Will felt terrible about what he’d said to Mama—calling her a whore. It couldn’t be true. Could it? How else could she explain why three different men might have fathered him?
Who was he now? If Mac wasn’t his father, was he even a McDougall? Had Mac adopted Will like he’d adopted Maria?
The questions spun in Will’s head, and he couldn’t answer any of them.
The notion that a man like Jacob Johnson might be his father made Will want to retch again. But he had nothing in his gut to puke.
Coates started banging around in the barn, then the man’s wagon creaked as his mules pulled it into the yard and onto the road. Soon silence surrounded Will again. He laid on his pallet and dozed, wondering whether to sneak into the cabin for food.
After visiting the sheriff, Mac rode Valiente to Daniel Abercrombie’s claim. Will often ran off to spend time with Jonah. Perhaps that’s where the boy had spent the night. Mac wanted to search the obvious haunts before returning to Jenny. He wanted to have something to report to her.
Daniel and his older sons had already left for the fields by the time Mac arrived. Mac talked to Esther. “Have you seen Will?”
“Will? No. Why—is he missing?” she asked.
She knew the full story, so Mac described who Jacob Johnson was and the man’s attack on Jenny and Will. “Will found out Johnson might be his father.”
Esther gasped. “Oh, no. Come inside and sit. Have some coffee.”
“I don’t have much time,” Mac said, doffing his hat and entering the house. “Do you have any idea where Will might be? Any places he and Jonah would go off to?”
Esther shooed her younger children outside, all except the littlest toddler. Then she poured Mac a mug of coffee. “No. They ramble through the woods huntin’ sometimes. Fish in the creek. I can ask Jonah when he returns.”
“Where are Daniel and the boys working today?” Mac asked. “I’ll go talk to Jonah myself.”
“The fields toward your old claim,” she said. “Least ways, that’s what Daniel said this mornin’.”
Mac thanked Esther for the coffee and rode Valiente down the road in search of Daniel and Jonah. He found them planting corn in a field near the creek between their property and Mac’s claim. Mac remembered clearing that field with Daniel and other men the winter after they’d arrived in Oregon. It was one of the first fields planted on Daniel’s farm.
Mac greeted them, then asked Jonah, “Have you seen Will since yesterday?”
“No, sir,” Jonah said, shaking his head. “Ain’t seen him since Sunday services.”
“Do you know where he might be?” Mac demanded.
Jonah seemed puzzled at Mac’s vehemence. “No, sir. What’s wrong?”
“Will ran off, and I need to find him.”
“Somethin’ wrong?” Daniel asked.
“I explained to Esther,” Mac said, certain Esther would tell Daniel the story later. “I need to find Will. Jenny’s worried about him.” He turned to Jonah again. “Is there someplace you boys hide? A secret place? I used to have a tree fort I’d go to as a lad.”
“Not really, sir,” Jonah said. “We hang around our barn, or the barn over at your claim. Where Mr. Coates lives now. But we only go there when it’s cold or wet. Otherwise, we stay in the woods when we ain’t helpin’ on the farm.”
“All right,” Mac said. “I’ll ride by my claim before I head back to town.” He nodded at the others. “If you see Will, please send him home.”
Mac trotted Valiente toward his claim, wondering why Will would seek refuge there. They hadn’t lived on that land since the boy was three years old. Mac had built a cabin for Jenny, a home for her and her baby. But Mac never intended to live on the land with her, and he’d left as soon as the worst of the winter was behind them in early 1848.
He was sorry soon enough that he left her. He’d intended to travel back to Boston, but when he learned of the gold strike in California, he stayed there. After two years in California, when he realized the riches he’d found hadn’t made him happy, he returned to Jenny and married her. They’d been together ever since. Should he have stayed with her in forty-eight? They might not have been as wealthy without his gold diggings, but they would have had two more years together.
Would it have made a difference to Will if Mac had stayed? Mac often sensed a distance in his relationship with the boy, an uneasiness he didn’t feel with Cal or Nate. He tried to treat Will the same as his other children, but maybe the awkwardness was Mac’s fault, not Will’s. Maybe Will remembered when Mac was away. Maybe Will sensed Mac withholding his affections, though Mac tried to treat him the same as the other children. And maybe, in fact, Mac hadn’t loved the boy enough.
When he pulled into the yard at his claim, it was quiet. Mac shouted for the tenant, then for Will. No answer.
